“Rare classes?” IEatTortillas was confused.
They had been walking through the woods when IEatTortillas had brought up the fact that they were all level 10 and ready for class advancements. She’d mentioned that they probably should have gotten their classes before heading out to fight whatever was in the woods since she was confident it wouldn’t be just a normal monster.
According to the villagers that Attracting had talked to the wolves had moved towards their village recently. The reason wasn’t that they were bolder; it was because they were all starving. Something had apparently come one day and taken to living in the woods. A new apex predator that ruled and hunted on its own terms. One that all the wolves together couldn’t fight against. But Attracting had let her know that it was better if they didn’t get their classes first.
“There are different classes that become available if you do different things. If you show the system that you’re skilled in certain areas or display certain characteristics, then you can unlock rare and powerful classes.”
Seven nodded her head along to his words. He had spoken about everything she had experienced spot on. Seeing her nodding, Attracting smiled.
“Don’t worry. You should be able to easily get the magi class. I read that the test isn’t that hard.” Attracting reassured her.
“Uh-huh.” She responded noncommittally.
She was getting kind of pissed off at his attitude towards her that had spanned the last couple of days.
‘Why does he just assume I wouldn’t be able to get a rarer class?’
He turned to IEatTortillas, “You’ll definitely be able to get a better class. I heard that there are only rare classes now, but later there will be even better ones. Even legendary classes might appear if we follow certain conditions. We’ve done a few quests beforehand and now we’re even going to fight the monsters in the woods. That means we should probably already be a candidate for a rare class, maybe even something better.”
‘I’ll be here too.’ Seven ignored the fact that she already had her class.
Suddenly she was rethinking her decision to tell them about her new class. Maybe she’d wait until after they’d received theirs. It might give Attracting the wake-up call that he needed. He was being a bit of a douche. Then she realised something.
‘Why did he wait for Ana to tell us about these classes? I’ve been online awhile. He probably saw me hit level 10 on his friend list as well but he didn’t bring me to do the village quests or let me know that doing them could give me a better class. I don’t even think he’d have told me about this quest if he didn’t have to.”
Suddenly Seven found herself far more frustrated than she’d intended. It was like Attracting hadn’t intended to help her unlock a rare class in the first place. She was just the byproduct of being near her friend.
They began to walk deeper into the woods. Attracting moved in front of them by a few meters with confidence but IEatTortillas and Seven stayed back as they surveyed their surroundings carefully. Before they knew it Attracting had moved out of their sight, but they could still see him on the map.
-Oh my god, Milly, I’m so sorry, if I’d known about the quests I would have told you and insisted you come along with us. I had no idea that it would impact our classes.-
Seven kept moving, but a smile broke out onto her face as she received a private message from IEatTortillas.
-That’s alright,- She sent back, -The truth is I already got my class when I hit level 10. I got a rare class! I’m a Nimble Mage. I’ll share the stats with you, I was going to tell you guys earlier but Andrew’s being a dickwad.-
-I know right?- the reply was almost immediate -I have no idea what's gotten into him. I know you’re not as competitive as us but he’s never just outright ignored his friends like this. Also, damn Milly, that’s so cool! You’re pretty strong now.-
-Oh well,- Seven shrugged, -shows what he knows. He’ll probably change his attitude after I’ve shown him my class. But I won’t do that yet. I’ll wait until after he’s gotten his class.-
“Hey, it’s over here.”
Attracting’s voice cut in through the treeline and the two looked at each other, running to catch up to him. They soon found themselves in a clearing and starting into a cave that seemed to dig at an angle into the ground and go on until it was completely dark.
“So what’s in here?” IEatTortillas shuffled nervously, ready to run if anything big jumped out of the cave towards her.
*Thump*
The ground shook rhythmically and a muffled roar threw a burst of wind out of the cave entrance.
“I guess we’re about to find out.” Seven lifted her wand towards the darkness.
From the sounds of it, something big was coming their way.
Attracting had already moved into a position close to the cave mouth. If something came out he would probably attract its attention before anyone else in the party. Seven glanced at his action and nodded to herself. She would have a very good show to watch if it forced him to dodge and attack using his skills. She would use the fight to learn as much as she could.
The tremors grew violent and the surrounding trees were shaking. The clearing darkened as something poked out of the cave, a large head. Then a body, with two injured wings and clawed, scaly feet.
[Injured Cave Dragon - Lvl 15]
Seven’s eyes twinkled at the sight of it.
‘It’s beautiful.’
The game had really outdone itself on the design. The dragon’s wings looked like an even larger creature had attacked them, the basic structure remaining intact but it couldn’t fly because of the large, pulsating scars that crisscrossed the appendages. It was over seven meters long and three meters tall, glimmering as the light snuck through the tree clearing and sparkled against its scales. Its orange eyes narrowed as it saw the intruders trying to get into its domain and its claws raised menacingly. It was truly something that she wanted to defeat.
She shook her head. Now wasn’t the time to think about that.
The Cave Dragon roared into the air so ferociously that even the leaves dropped from the surrounding trees. The entire clearing became shrouded with leaves blowing around. Just the movement of the monster’s body caused the breeze to turn into a gale.
Seven felt a leaf cut into her as it was whipped around by the high winds.
-1
They were taking damage just by being in the same area as it.
“That's…” IEatTortillas hesitated.
“So damn cool.” Seven interrupted him as she stared at the monster.
A real live dragon in all its majesty. She couldn’t have imagined something like this in any of the other games she had played. She could see that they had no chance against it, or at least she wouldn’t have in the past.
Now she had more confidence.
‘How can I dodge it?’ She pondered as the dragon locked onto the nearest target.
“Not a bad catch.” Attracting was as confident as ever as he began to fire magic blasts at the beast.
-6
He didn’t do bad damage for a person who was level 10 without a class. Seven fired towards the creature as well. The dragon roared in response as the battle began. It lifted a claw and swiped at Attracting, but he dodged it with an almost impossibly good timing.
-10
‘Ah.’
She looked at the damage in surprise. It was a lot higher now that she had 20 points of intelligence. Even if she was trying to hide the fact that she had a class she couldn’t change her higher stats. But the dragon’s health barely had a dent in it.
‘Well, if the fight gets too hard I’m just going to Ice Bolt the thing anyway.’
She wasn’t confident that she could dodge the dragon. Not until she saw its attack pattern.
IEatTortillas walked towards it with her sword drawn out. She didn’t look confident but Seven could tell she would try her best to do damage and draw aggro away from the magic-focused Attracting.
Attracting saw her and motioned for her to back away. “Stand back. This thing will destroy you if you get too close.”
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
“Yeah well, I’ll only be able to damage it if I get close.” IEatTortillas retorted back but moved behind Attracting so that he would take the brunt of the creature's attacks.
“Look out!” Seven called to them.
The dragon lifted its forefeet into the air slammed them into the ground, causing a shock wave that damaged IEatTortillas and pushed him back. The moment the wave erupted from the ground Attracting jumped straight up and avoided both the damage and the knockback.
With a swift movement, he reached the dragon’s leg and sliced into it with the dagger he’d borrowed from IEatTortillas and then he blasted it with his magic.
Seven shot out blasts of magic towards the creature with her wand as she eyed the dagger. ‘I haven’t even seen Ana use the damn thing.’
Luckily she’d been outside of the shock wave’s radius. IEatTortillas barrelled past her and lifted his sword with a shout as he stabbed into the dragon’s wing. The dragon ignored him as though a mosquito had bitten it and focused its attention on Attracting. By shooting it with magic and comboing his attacks with the extra dagger attack he was able to do the most damage to the mighty creature.
“Damn this thing is hard to hit.” IEatTortillas tried to slice its neck but the dragon moved its head out of the way and retaliated by smacking her with its free claw.
Attracting ducked underneath its other claw and slashed at its head, drawing the attention back onto himself.
The dragon looked annoyed at him and stamped down with its foot. Attracting jumped back as a mini shock wave emerged from the ground and the dragon followed him with its claws. He dodged the first attack, then smiled as it attacked again. He leaped to the side to dodge it and a final attack followed through only for him to sidestep it as he moved out of its range.
He had successfully dodged all of its attacks.
He reciprocated by attacking back and it roared as IEatTortiallas joined the fight again. Seven continued to fire magic blasts at it from a safe distance.
‘All good so far.’
Attracting continued to dodge the oncoming attacks, jumping and sidestepping the claws and shock waves while also watching out for the occasional headbutt that the dragon tried to sneak in. Seven took it all in while trying to figure out if she could do the same.
‘No,’ she decided. ‘Not if I hadn’t seen the attacks before.’
It was simply impossible for her to tell when the dragon was going to attack and how. But she felt that she could dodge the attacks as they were now because she was slowly becoming used to them. Attracting was simply on another level compared to her. He was like a fish in water and she couldn’t work out how he’d foretold every single attack it threw at him.
The dragon suddenly became more violent as its health dropped further. It sped up its attacks against Attracting and his movements suddenly became wilder as he tried frantically to get used to the new timing of its attacks.
“Crap.”
Seven moved back as a stray claw caused Attracting to jump back towards her. IEatTortillas took over the attack as soon as he saw that Seven was in danger and the dragon turned towards him with an attack.
Attracting sighed as he saw the dragon’s attention turn away from him and then spotted Seven behind him.
“You shouldn’t put all your points into intelligence.” He looked at her with the look of someone teaching a child, “You have to spread it out or else you’ll out damage everyone but won’t have any mana regen or health.”
Before she could reply, he ran back to the fight and was back to shooting and dodging the dragon.
She shrugged and continued to fire magic blasts at the creature. She had plenty of mana now thanks to her high intelligence. She had hardly gone through half of it.
-1
There was still the occasional damage from the leaves whenever the dragon moved from side to side. But thankfully Attracting had shifted the main damage dealer away from her. Unfortunately, now it was directing its aggression at IEatTortillas.
She blasted the dragon as it continued to attack IEatTortillas. With that last attack blasting Attracting out of position the fight had suddenly become a lot more dangerous. They were still dealing damage to it but even when IEatTortillas tried to dodge it he could feel himself being hit by the second and third claws. He popped a potion just as they brought the monster’s health below nearly 5%
The moments its health dropped the dragon let out a scream that caused them all to freeze in place.
[You have been hit by the petrifying scream. All movement is restricted for 3 seconds.]
It rooted her to the spot.
The dragon raised both of its scarred wings and brought them down towards Attracting and IEatTortillas.
Attracting tried to block the wings with his arms, but they blew him back through the trees. IEatTortillas struck the dragon with her sword before it could reach him but then its wing smacked against her body and he was flying out of the arena as well. It turned to stare at Seven and she gazed back at it intently. She felt the ability to move slowly returning to her body.
It was low on health.
The dragon let out a roar and pushed its claws against the ground, lifting itself up and using the momentum to crash towards her.
-5
She moved out of the way but felt a smack on her side as the dragon’s size and the last dregs of the movement restriction caused her to stumble. She spun around to face it before it could get the drop on her and found herself face to face with a claw.
-11
The dragon roared as she was blasted back by the force of its swing. She saw IEatTortillas on her side but apparently he’d been knocked out by the dragon’s previous attack because he wasn’t getting back up.
Seven lifted herself off the ground just as another claw smashed at her. She jumped backward and finally got enough distance between them to chug down a potion.
+25
She breathed deeply. “Let’s do this.”
She blasted it with two more shots and moved backward as she fired, buying herself more time.
The dragon snorted in reply and moved up to swipe her with its claws. She dodged it, but as though predicting her, it followed up with another attack.
-11
‘Damn.’
She had already watched its fight against Attracting; She shouldn’t have fallen for the second claw. She blasted it with more magic and it growled as its health became a small sliver of green against the almost entirely red bar. It lifted itself up and suddenly swiped its wing against her, forcing her to jump back even further out of its range. She could feel it clip her just as she moved.
-11
+25
She gasped as it hit her once more, but not because she was uncomfortable; She had finally figured out its pattern. She could see it raring to go and she knew that it was going to hit her with its wing again now.
-Dodge
Sure enough, it tried to slice her with its wing but she ducked underneath the attack.
‘I have you now you scaley bastard.’ She grinned.
It recovered from the attack and lifted its claw to swipe at her. She stepped back as it attacked.
-Dodge
She moved to the side as it followed up with a claw slash to the ground
-Dodge
Finally, it smacked the claw sideways towards her as she sidestepped and she tried to jump out of its range.
-11
-10
She retaliated with a magic blast but her grin widened. That last claw had barely hit her. Even if she wasn’t one hundred percent sure she could dodge it, she knew it would only be a matter of time. This battle was almost over.
It was on the lowest bit of health. She had grasped its attack pattern now. She just had to wait for it to swipe and she would be able to counterattack. Even if it tried to smash its wings against her she was sure she would come out on top. This was the moment she would truly shine.
She was going to kill it.
Before she could enact her plan, a bright blue light slipped in from her side and struck the damaged dragon square in the head.
-27
The dragon’s eyes widened and it let out a screech.
“That was close.” Attracting stepped into view. “It was about to kill you.”
“Kill me my ass!” Seven turned on him angrily but he’d already gone towards the corpse that was disappearing only to be replaced by a glowing green light.
He had stolen her kill, and that pissed her off.
She could feel that it was about to die. She had fought against it tooth and nail and was finally about to get the satisfaction of knowing she had surpassed her previous skills.
Then she sighed.
She could tell that it probably hadn’t looked like that from the outside. After all, there was no way Attracting could read her mind and tell that she was ready to dodge the attacks that she hadn’t been able to dodge previously. But she was still mad.
She had been so close only to have her victory taken away. She didn’t even know how he could even do that much damage to a monster like the dragon. It was even higher than before.
There definitely had to be some sort of trick to that move or else he would have used it continuously during the fight.
“Well then.” She looked at the loot. “What did we get?”
The green light excited her. She’d had terrible luck with the drops so far and had to purchase her only armour. If this green drop was something usable by magi she was sure they would allow her to have it. Just like they’d given the dagger to IEatTortillas before.
Greaves of Strength (Blue):
Strength: +5
Vitality +4
Holy Book IV (Green):
Wisdom: +5
Vitality +7
Silver: 5
“Oh damn those drops are awesome.” She could definitely use both of them.
“The book is best for a priest since my class uses wisdom as its main stat.” Attracting eyed it appreciatively.
Both Seven and IEatTortillas nodded. He had done the most damage because of his double attacks. Even when she was firing off shot after shot Seven had just barely fallen short and Attracting had taken most of the aggression the entire battle.
“As for the greaves...” He passed them onto IEatTortillas, “These are definitely best suited for a warrior. Sorry, Seven.”
“Oh um, I guess you’re right.” Seven felt miffed but there wasn’t much she could say to rebut that. He was definitely right that this wouldn’t suit a person becoming a mage, let alone someone that already was one. The strength alone would give IEatTortillas a major advantage, especially during his class test.
‘Damn I got nothing.’ Seven felt let down. Both items had looked insanely good.
Because she hadn’t gotten any of the items IEatTortillas gave her most of the silver, 4 out of 5. He reasoned that she should have his share of the silver as well because the armour he’d gotten was worth a lot more than just a single silver.
“Ohh, this is it.” IEatTortillas gave a thumb up to Seven, “Time for us to all get our classes.”
Seven smiled back at him. She had levelled up from the dragon three times, making her experience bar stop at around 60% Level 13, but Attracting hadn’t figured out that she had a class yet. After the fight he was preoccupied checking the loot of the dragon, and he hadn’t checked her level after the fight.
At this point she was just keeping it hidden out of spite because, honestly, his entire attitude had annoyed her. It wasn’t as though he couldn’t find out easily if he wanted to.
“Yeah.” Attracting agreed, “After killing this dragon there’s no way we don’t get something good.”
He turned towards the cave with a twinkle in his eye.
“But how about we check if there’s anything nice in there first?”
Seven smiled at his words.
It was time to go treasure hunting.